I have driven all over my city. I’ve been to different places and followed different directions. The one thing I’ve learned is there’s often more than one way to get someplace. And, depending upon who you ask, someone will tell you that their way is always the quickest. I’m sure this is true.
I’m sure this is true, the same as it’s true with doctors or car mechanics. According to most, “Their” guy is the best guy (or woman, if you prefer). Meanwhile, with the preferred pronouns being excluded, as good as anyone is in this world; the truth is we’re all human. No one walks on water. No one is above mistakes. And put simply, no one is perfect.

The memory comes back sometimes. This comes in little hints about a time before now. We call this the past. We call this a part of a program. This is what taught us how to live, how to react and respond, how to become biased or maybe opinionated, and how to jump to conclusions or predict the future. All of which stem from lessons we learned along the way. These lessons come from the tales and the tragedies of our past. We can predict.
Consider something. Consider the way the brain works and how we can read something predictively, even though we know the words are spelled wrong. The mind can un-jumble a jumbled word. There have been studies that show how the brain only needs letters to appear in a certain way to be read and understood.
(I laugh about this because perhaps this accounts for the errors as I type… wink, wink.)

Sunrise, and ah. I have to get myself ready. I have things to do and places to go. I have a job. I have a life happening right before my eyes. Some of this is easy and some is challenging. I have people who I can count on and people who I contend with. Put simply, I am like you or anyone else here.
I have my cup of coffee with me now. I have quiet music playing in the background. I have me and I have you. I only say this because I like to break things down and keep them simple. I see this as a benefit to me. Otherwise, it’s easy to overthink. It’s easy to react or better yet, it’s easy to overreact. Life is complicated enough without my input. And therefore, I write this for both you and I and the overly critical. I write this for us, the people who feel too much and dissect too many things. This is for us, the ones that could use a little extra push to get the day going.

Whatever happened or whatever the instance was that changed us, the truth is there’s another side to everyone. There is something below the layers upon layers of added life. There’s another side to me and to you as well. There is however the world in front of us.
There are the people we know and the people we meet. There’s the news on television, which of course, is not the most helpful. There’s always something going on in this world. Isn’t there?
There’s always some kind of fight or finger pointing. There’s always someone looking to push the blame. Then there’s the bills we pay. There’s the work we do and the life we live. And then there’s something like the traffic on the Cross-Bronx, the Belt Parkway or the Long Island Expressway, which is enough to make anyone crazy. As for me, I’m on a different side of the bridges now. My stressors are on the FDR and the Harlem River Drive to merge onto and cross over the George Washington Bridge.
I have other stressors though. I have more than my frustrations behind the wheel. I have different connections that link my thoughts to different events. I have insecurities that derail my hopes and challenge my dreams. I swear, the most truthful and brilliant statement I’ve ever heard is when I heard about our ability to think ourselves sick. 

It was the late comedian Mitch Hedberg who told a joke about a friend that showed him a picture and said, “Here’s a picture of me when I was younger.” Hedberg responded, “Every picture is a picture of you when you’re younger.”

I think this is brilliant. I think the truth is everything we did is something we did when we were younger. I say this because the world moves. We might not feel this happening. We can see it though. Either way, nothing ever stops. Time is the most awesome vehicle of all.

Not all is lost on the old days. Or maybe it would be better to say that not all of my old ways were bad. Instead, I have learned to merge my older patterns with the newer edition of life. At one point, yes, I lived differently. Perhaps some would call this growth. On the other hand, I just call this being me.
I understand when people say there is no honor amongst thieves. I’ve heard this before. I have also heard long winded lectures and hard-to-listen-to diatribes from different people in my life.
I don’t think I am alone with this. I think this is part of growing up. I think this is part of life because there is always someone coming around here, trying to say how to live, how to do things or how to be. They say this as if they are the perfect authority. But no. They’re not.

Everyone is playing a game with their suggestions. This of course is their projection of their beliefs and their opinions. And this is fine too. This is not always bad either. There is always a lesson somewhere. Some of the lessons are useful and some are painful but either way, we learn. Right?

I go back to the lesson I was taught about the animals in the forest. I go back to the idea about the deer when hearing a sound and how the deer runs for safety.
Eventually, the deer finds safety and stops running. Eventually, the deer goes back to whatever it is that a deer will do. By the way, this is how the deer survives danger.
The difference between us is interesting. As the superior species, we too have our own survival instinct. However, the difference between us and the deer is we cling to our fear. We live in the past.
Animals go back to doing whatever it is they do. But us, not so much. Unlike the other animals in the animal kingdom, we hold the fear. We hold the anxieties. We tense up. We react or respond in the future with preemptive strikes to protect us or defend ourselves from the elements. We assume. We form biases and prejudices.
We think way too much. Meanwhile, the deer, the rabbit or the little bird that flew away because something dangerous came too close; they go on with the rest of their lives. But us, not so much. We live in the past. We live in our memories and the unresolved tensions or previous traumas and unwanted outcomes.

There is a way things work. Everyone knows this. We might not always know or fully understand the science behind something like a light bulb or the way electricity works. But at minimum, we know that if we flip the switch, the light goes on. The same can be said about a car. We might not fully understand the work behind auto mechanics, but, it’s safe to say that we know what happens when we turn the ignition, start the car, step on the gas, and go. I simplify this, not to be silly, basic or to insult anyone’s intelligence. Instead, I simplify this to create an easy example.

I have been part of the regular working world for about three decades. I have worked as a salesman. I have had easy jobs and tough jobs. However, for the last 23 years, I have what I call my “Day job,” which is what I use to feed my family. Over the last five years, I have been working an extra job to feed my heart. One job feeds my family and the other job feeds my sanity. For me, it’s that simple.

I am older now. I am out of range from my past. So are you, by the way. Older. Out of range. We are out of reach from yesterday’s grip. No matter how close this seems. Yesterday is still gone and neither of us live there anymore.
I am far from the time when I was lost but yet, there will be times ahead where I will feel lost again. And consequently, there will be times when I am found once more. There will be days when I am enlightened and delivered. There will be days where I am confused and burdened.
There is of course, this journey we call life. There is the search for “Self” and the drive to achieve or “Arrive” so-to-speak. There is the need to fit and the need to understand and comprehend. More to the point, there is a need to achieve balance. There is a need to find that station in life, in which all is stable or harmonious. And too, — there is the misunderstanding that balance or serenity is the absence of adversity.